


No Rest for the Wicked

by airshipmechanic



Series: The Magnificent Borderlands [1]
Category: The Magnificent Seven (2016)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Science Fiction, Borderlands AU, Canon-Typical Violence, M/M, Pining, Pre-Canon, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-22
Updated: 2019-04-22
Packaged: 2020-01-24 06:17:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,423
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18565633
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/airshipmechanic/pseuds/airshipmechanic
Summary: Pandora is a desolate hellhole of a planet, where people live and die by their wits, guns, and ruthlessness. More often than not, folks go there to escape something - like a bounty on the head of an assassin, for instance, or the reputation of a sniper in the Corporate Wars. And sometimes, while in the process of escaping, people fall in love. (In short: The Borderlands AU of The Magnificent Seven that absolutely no one asked for, but that I needed to write.)





	No Rest for the Wicked

**Author's Note:**

> I watched The Magnificent Seven too close to a playthrough of Borderlands 2 and was struck by how easily I could slide my favorite cowboys into a sci-fi world that has so much in common with the old west. Once the idea got into my head, it wasn't going anywhere until I wrote it.

Nobody came to Pandora unless they were desperate or crazy. 

It sure as hell wasn’t the kind of planet anybody would go to on vacation. Even if the raiders and the Psychos that were all that remained of the old mining operations weren’t a problem (and they were, constantly), just the wildlife on Pandora was terrifying. And not just the animals - half the _plants_ on Pandora could kill a man who wasn’t careful. The scenery wasn’t anything to Echo home about, not unless you took a fancy to slag mines, treacherous mountains, or endless desert. The cuisine wasn’t exactly an attraction, either – griddle cakes and skag ribs and maybe a half-assed attempt at Artemisian burritos here and there. The planet was widely agreed all across the known universe to be a hellhole full of criminals. 

More than one of the corporations that ruled the six galaxies had tried and failed to conquer it. Dahl’s mining operations had lasted no more than twenty years before they packed up and abandoned the colonies they’d established. The attempts Atlas made to take over digging the planet’s riches out of the ground hadn’t gone any better. Why Hyperion thought they’d do any better, nobody could really say – crazy, most folks guessed, because as well equipped as they were, desperation clearly wasn’t the problem. Greed could make people crazy, after all, and since the Vault had been opened, Pandora had become a greater prize for the greedy than ever. It didn’t just have slag for mining now; it had the purple glowing eridium, a source of power and wealth with potential that hadn’t even begun to be fully exploited. 

Full exploitation was Hyperion’s stock in trade. Nobody knew that better than Billy Rocks. They’d owned him, once. They’d thought he was an assassin who could never be turned against them, because they’d programmed him to be incapable of it. They didn’t count on him turning _himself_ , developing self-awareness and deciding that he wasn’t killing for anybody but himself anymore. That put him on the bounty list, of course, and there was no place better to dodge a bounty than Pandora.  
Desperate. That’s why Billy Rocks had come to this planet. He was desperate to live long enough to figure himself out and determine what it was he wanted now that he had the freedom to want. Hyperion had a space station orbiting Pandora, but they didn’t have a foothold there, and it seemed like the best chance Billy was going to find, despite what he knew of the place. 

He’d known to anticipate trouble; he’d done jobs on Pandora before. He knew about the flowers that would explode into flames if they were hit too hard, about the Psychos and the raiders and the bullymongs, about the unforgiving desert and tundra. He hadn’t realized the kind of trouble he might find _personally_ , though. 

“We don’t serve your kind,” the bartender said. The computer that made up half of Billy’s brain placed the accent as coming from the southern continent of the planet Hermes. Most of the others in the filthy wreck of a bar sounded the same. 

“What kind is that?” Billy was cool and calm, something that normally served him well when dealing with the hotheads that seemed to make up the entire population of this planet. 

“Robots,” came the blunt, snarled reply. 

“I’m a cyborg,” Billy said, because it wasn’t the same thing at all as a robot. If he explained in small enough words, maybe the barman would understand and Billy could get down to having a drink in peace. 

“Like I said, the Holy Spirits don’t serve robots.” 

Before Billy could even respond, a patron took up the cause. “You heard the man! Now get out before we throw you out, ya jumped-up toaster!” 

Billy turned to look at him without saying a word. It was a stupid fight to get in, and he knew it. He could just walk away and be done with it. It had been a long day, and it would be a long walk to the next settlement, and he’d be better off just getting started on it instead of wasting his time on a bunch of skag-licking drunks. 

But he _really_ wanted that whiskey. 

“Try it,” he said. 

And they did. They tried real hard. Not just the bartender and the patron who fancied himself a bouncer, either. Several other patrons joined in, as did the _actual_ bouncer, then a couple of guys who’d just wandered in off the street, and next thing Billy knew he was fighting the whole damn bar. 

He put them down one after another, with a combination of controlled blasts with an SMG, precise handgun shots, well-placed punches, and finally a slag grenade to take out the group of big fellas in the back. He was exhausted, shield depleted, and looking around to see if anybody else wanted trouble when he heard a surprisingly calm and untroubled voice coming up at his left say, “Whiskey, was it?” 

Billy spun around with his revolver pointed at the man’s chest, but relaxed a bit when he saw that the newcomer had his hands up where he could see them. He wasn’t going for a gun or spoiling for a fight – he was smiling, in fact, a twinkle in his bright blue eyes. 

“Easy, partner,” he said, with an accent Billy liked the sound of but couldn’t place. It was almost like the way people on the other side of the Dust sounded, but not quite. He sounded smoother, more cultured. Eden-6, maybe? “I’m not looking for trouble – wanted to pour that drink for you, actually, and one for myself if you don’t mind a bit of company.” 

It wasn’t the kind of greeting Billy was used to getting on Pandora. Billy eyed the stranger warily, but he lowered his gun and nodded. He hadn’t had company in a long time, and he had earned that drink, even if he would have rather just put a dollar down for it.  
“Name’s Goodnight Robicheaux,” the man said as he walked around behind the bar, heedless of the dead and unconscious bodies all around. “And you, I’m guessing, are Billy Rocks.”  
Billy promptly stiffened up again; anyone who knew his name wasn’t going to know it for a good reason. He knew the name Goodnight Robicheaux, too – a deadly sniper for the Maliwan army in the Corporate Wars, with anywhere between 150 and 400 confirmed kills, depending on who was telling the stories. And sure enough, a quick glance showed the distinctive black-and-electric blue stock of a Maliwan Rakehell on his back - probably he wasn’t lying about his name. Billy’s hand went straight to the gun at his hip. He didn’t draw it, but he was ready to. 

“What makes you think that?” Billy asked carefully. 

“Seen ya on the bounty boards,” Goodnight answered. He poured whiskey into one glass, then another, and pushed the first across the bar to Billy. There was a slight tremor in his hands that a normal man wouldn’t, probably couldn’t, have noticed. Billy did, though, and promptly shifted to a more detailed analysis. Goodnight Robicheaux’s heart rate was elevated, respiration rate a little faster than it ought to be – classic signs of nervousness or fear, despite the man’s outward calm. 

“Do you mean to collect that bounty?” Billy asked, aloof as ever. He took the whiskey in his left hand; his right stayed on his gun. 

“Oh, lord no!” Goodnight laughed, full and loud, and when he looked at Billy it was with a sideways grin. “Mister, I just watched you take down this whole shitty bar. Even if I thought I could take you in alive, which I know I couldn’t – hell, I don’t think I could probably manage to take you in dead – you’re clearly not a man to arrest. You, sir, are a man to befriend.” 

“I don’t have many friends.” The correct statement from Billy would have been that he didn’t have _any_ friends. Anyone he might have once called a friend was lost along with most other memories of his life before Hyperion, and everything after Hyperion Billy had faced alone. He wouldn’t even know what to do with a friend. 

“Neither do I,” Goodnight replied easily. “But after seeing what just happened here, I think we might be able to do each other some good.” 

Billy still looked skeptical. “How?” 

It was a newly formed idea, one that Goodnight had just begun developing as he had watched this scene unfold. Watched Billy get his money turned down, watched the bar patron start the fight, watched Billy thoroughly _end_ the fight. The wheels in his mind had started turning right away, and now he tried to put it all together in words to form a proposition that Billy might consider accepting. 

“So here’s the thing,” he said. “You knew my name soon as you heard it, right? Most folks on Pandora have. It tends to grease the works a little – folks who’ll tell you they won’t pour you a whiskey, well, a lot of ‘em’ll change their minds right quick if you’re rolling with me. As for what I get out of it…I think we can put together a better business model together than either of us has got going right now. I hate bounty hunting, to tell the truth – I already did my time killing for the corporate overlords. So what I propose is this: we partner up. Whatever jobs we find, you do the parts that need shooting, and I do the parts that need talking. Then whatever money we make or loot we take, we split up, equal shares.” 

Billy tilted his head to the side, surprised at the offer. Nobody ever offered equal shares right out of the gate on Pandora. Nobody offered equal shares to a guy they thought was mostly robotic, either. And on its face, the deal sounded good. Billy was good at fighting, but he didn’t like talking any more than Goodnight liked shooting. He was bad at it, too, and he could see in just this one conversation that Goodnight Robicheaux was damn good at it. It might be nice to be able to just stick to the work he liked and let someone else handle the rest, and then walk into a bar and order a drink without having to fight anybody for it. 

The offer hung in the air a long time, mixing with the smell of blood and whiskey and a trace of Goodnight’s cologne, until finally Billy gave his answer. 

“Guess we’d better head to Haven.”

***

It quickly became evident that Goodnight Robicheaux’s plan of dividing the labor and conquering the job had in fact been an excellent one. He and Billy pulled down one after another – making deliveries, convincing people to pay what they owed, escorting traders, eliminating raiders, stealing things, recovering things that had been stolen, blowing up skag dens, and a million other things – and they made good money doing it. Within a few months, the work started taking them all over Pandora. They saw the Dust, the Tundra, the Salt Flats, and the Badlands, and started to see how maybe some of that scenery was pretty, if you looked at it right. They took jobs in settlements with all kinds of people, and Billy finally started to see some of the good side of the planet. It wasn’t _all_ raiders and Psychos and people who wanted to give him shit over having some metal parts – there were good folks, too, doing their best with a hard road to walk.

Traveling Pandora with Goodnight was an altogether different experience than traveling alone. The man was full of stories, and he loved telling them. Funny stories about scrapes he’d gotten into, beautiful stories about friends and family he’d known, interesting stories about people and places on Pandora that gave Billy a new perspective on the place. He talked about books he’d read, dramas he’d watched on the ECHO-net, plays and operas he’d seen back on his home planet. He talked all the time, and Billy quickly began to enjoy the sound of it. He liked the stories, especially the ones that made him laugh, and he just plain liked the sound of Goodnight’s voice. Even if his companion wasn’t so good at paving the way with other people, Billy thought he would have liked traveling with him just for the company. 

Goodnight _didn’t_ talk about the Corporate Wars, not unless someone made him. That was what people wanted to talk about in bars, when they were using Goodnight’s name to get work or a drink: who’d you kill, how many, what guns, what shields, how’d you end up here. Those stories, Billy noticed quickly, were different every time. Whatever the truth was, Goodnight wasn’t telling it, not to these barflies and wannabe vault hunters. He turned up the charm and the drama, and though his audience couldn’t see it, Goodnight hated every second of talk about the wars. Billy knew, though, and he didn’t even need his ECHO-eye to notice it anymore. He’d spent so much time on the road watching and listening as Goodnight talked that he could tell even without a vital signs analysis when Goodnight was feeling the pressure. 

Even if he couldn’t tell in the moment, he’d be able to tell afterward. When Goodnight had to talk about the Corporate Wars, that was when the dreams would wake him with a violent start or a shout of terror. To start off with, Billy had ignored it, pretended to still be sleeping. He would listen in silence as Goodnight got up and took a swig or two from his flask with shaking hands and stared into the darkness a while before making himself go back to bed. 

It was about six months into their partnership when, for the first time, Billy didn’t pretend to keep sleeping. He woke to the sound of Goodnight talking, and realized that this time, Goodnight had only managed to wake Billy up, not himself. Billy wasn’t sure if he should wake his partner or not – the dream could pass, after all, or being awakened might just make it harder to shake off. But the indistinct sound of panicked talking soon turned to a whimper of terror, and Billy decided that no amount of being awakened could be worse than continuing to suffer whatever Goodnight’s subconscious mind was putting him through. 

Billy sat up, leaned over the small space between their hotel beds, and gently touched Goodnight’s arm. “Goody, wake up,” he said quietly, and when there was no effect, rubbed his arm like he might have petted a frightened animal. “Wake up,” he said again, a little more firmly this time, and that finally did the trick. Goodnight sat up sharply with a startled gasp, and he grabbed for Billy’s hand. He let go almost as quickly, as if suddenly realizing what he was doing, while he was still trying to catch his breath. 

“You all right?” Billy asked, voice low and quiet. 

Goodnight nodded. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I…” 

Billy looked at him with sympathy as, for the first time in his memory, Goodnight struggled for something to say. “You don’t have to talk about it, if you don’t want to.” 

Relieved, Goodnight’s shoulders relaxed into a slump. He didn’t want to explain the things that haunted him, all the dead and dying faces and the barn owl that swooped after him in his dreams and left him paralyzed with fear. He didn’t want to tell any of it to anyone, not on this planet where any sign of weakness could get him killed. 

“Thank you,” Goodnight softly replied. He didn’t move, didn’t say anything further. Billy wasn’t even sure what he was being thanked for, but he knew he wasn’t quite done worrying about his partner yet. 

“Want a smoke?” he asked. 

Goodnight looked up to meet his face with a slight, grateful smile. “Nah, I remember you saying this morning you were down to your last.” 

Billy shrugged off the concern. “We’ll share it,” he said, and picked the near-empty pack up off the little table that sat between their beds. “Equal, remember? Fifty-fifty.” 

Goodnight hadn’t meant individual cigarettes when he’d said that, especially Billy’s, but he was in no frame of mind for arguing at the moment. Billy lit up and took one long drag, and when he passed it over to Goodnight, Goodnight took it. The smoke stung at the back of his throat, but it calmed his nerves as he inhaled. He took two puffs before passing it back to Billy and turning to set his feet on the floor and brace his forearms on his thighs. 

“You’re a better friend than I deserve, Billy Rocks,” he murmured, and just barely caught Billy’s shrug in his peripheral vision. 

“If either of us gets what we deserve, we’ll be in big trouble,” Billy replied, and gave him a little ghost of a smile. His heart warmed at seeing a similar one in return from Goodnight followed by a rueful chuckle. Goodnight made him laugh all the time, when no one else could or even bothered to; it felt good to return the favor. 

“Yes, I suppose that’s right,” Goodnight admitted. He didn’t know all of what Billy had done before they met, but he knew enough. A Hyperion assassin’s conscience was no more clear than his own, no matter how Goodnight would argue that Billy’d had a lot less choice in the matter than he had. They both had a right to feel how they felt. 

They passed the cigarette back and forth until it was smoked down to nothing, talking little. Eventually they went back to sleep, and when Goodnight woke, there was no sign of the previous night’s distress. They moved on out of town as planned, heading for the next job, and it looked from the outside as though nothing at all had changed. From the inside, though, they both knew that something fundamental had shifted in their relationship. They had been partners and they had been friendly, but that small exchange of nicotine and vulnerability had made them _friends_.

***

The stories had always flowed easily from Goodnight, but after the first half a year, Billy began to tell a few of his own. At the same time, Goodnight began to tell some of the more personal stories about himself, and Billy slowly began to do the same. Goodnight talked about how he’d joined the Maliwan army in the Corporate Wars just because he grew up in a Maliwan town and that was what his father and his older brother were doing. Billy talked about signing up with Hyperion to get his family out of debt, with no idea how the cybernetics experiments were going to change him and his life forever. Goodnight had always had tales of his old friend Sam, but he finally told the one about how the Crimson Lance soldier had pulled him out of the gutter in Sanctuary and stopped him from drinking himself to death. Billy in turn talked about how little he remembered from the time before Hyperion, how the agony of the experiments and the programming had erased it all until he couldn’t remember his own real name.

They grew closer, and Billy began to realize that he wanted to be closer still. He’d always thought of himself as someone without much drive for romance or sex, but it seemed that changed when he came to know someone deeply and forge a close friendship. He found himself looking at Goodnight more, even getting caught up staring. He started to notice things – the piercing blue of Goodnight’s eyes, the warm timbre of his voice, the way his cowboy hat sat at just a bit of an angle, how his jacket framed his shoulders and hips to excellent advantage. Billy spent a whole story about Goodnight’s younger sister’s lizard-catching habit when she was five not actually paying attention to a word of it, just watching Goodnight’s lips move. His partner was turning into a terrible distraction, and Billy didn’t have the first idea what to do with it. 

Therefore, he did nothing. He’d done plenty of gambling in his time with Goodnight; he knew when the stakes were too high to bet on no matter what the odds. 

“My daddy used to say, never bet anything you can’t stand to lose.” 

Goodnight had told him that once, while in the process of stepping out of a dice game in a saloon in Fyrestone. Their partnership, their friendship…those were both things that Billy couldn’t stand to lose, so he wasn’t about to bet them just to slake his desire to know what Goodnight’s lips tasted like. What they had was good, _real_ good, and while Billy was brave enough to walk into a bullymong cave armed with nothing but a big stick, Billy was not brave enough to risk throwing what he had with Goodnight away for the possibility of maybe having more. He kept his feelings to himself, and on the occasions that he thought maybe Goodnight was showing similar interest, Billy always talked himself out of saying anything. 

Summer found them at Mad Moxxi’s Underdome, taking on a different way of making money. They’d been working and traveling together almost a year then, passing cigarettes and flask back and forth, sharing stories and rooms. The Underdome was a fighting arena, and they quickly discovered that they could pull in more money in a week there than they could in a month anywhere else. The prize loot Billy won taking on all comers was good to begin with, and Goodnight pulled in even more running bets among the audience. 

“We stay the summer here, we could be set for life,” Billy remarked one night, after Goodnight had counted out their shares. It was even more money than the day before, and they’d already stacked up a lot. 

Goodnight gave him one of those crooked smiles that always made Billy feel a little too warm. “You trying to retire on me, cher? Leave me to my fate while you go eat huevos rancheros on a fancy hacienda on Artemis?” 

“What makes you think I’d leave you to your fate?” Goodnight had to be joking, didn’t he? Billy thought he must be, and yet there was something in his eyes, some bit of sadness hiding behind his smile that made Billy think Goodnight might actually believe what he was saying. 

Sure enough, at that question, Goodnight shrugged uncomfortably. “You come into that kind of money, enough to stop working, I don’t reckon you’d need me anymore.” He looked away, as if the poster on the wall of their hotel room was suddenly fascinating. 

Billy blinked in surprise at the response, and his reply came out of his mouth before he thought better of the phrasing. “I never have needed you.” 

He didn’t realize how it sounded until he saw the stricken look on Goodnight’s face. Goodnight was always so expressive, whether he wanted to be or not; his idea of a poker face was an easy smile, because he’d never learned to look neutral. Billy looked nothing _but_ neutral most of the time, and now he wondered if maybe that had been a mistake, because apparently Goodnight hadn’t the slightest understanding of how much he meant to Billy. 

“I mean, I never needed you for work, not any more than you needed me,” Billy said, trying to clarify fast enough that Goodnight didn’t just walk out the door. “You and I both could have kept on like we were if we wanted. You could run your betting scam in the Underdome with any decent fighter. We stick together because we like each other. Or I thought that was why, anyway.” 

It hadn’t occurred to Billy to be insecure in their friendship until that very moment. He’d taken it for granted that even if Goodnight didn’t love him like he wished for, Goodnight loved him as a friend. They relied on each other, trusted each other, took care of each other. The work had stopped mattering to Billy a long time ago. But what if that was the only reason Goodnight stuck around? He might just stick with Billy because with Billy, he’d hardly ever have to fire a shot at somebody. 

“No, it is,” Goodnight said quickly, to Billy’s great relief. “I just…I knew it mattered to me. I just wasn’t sure how much it mattered to you. Thought you might want to take off for greener pastures one day.” 

Billy shook his head. “If I retire to your imaginary hacienda on Artemis, Goody, I’m taking you with me.” 

“Yeah?” The hesitant, hopeful smile on Goodnight’s face was almost too much for Billy. He wanted to reach out to him, touch his cheek, tell him that he never wanted to go anywhere without him because he loved him too much to ever want to let go. Instead, Billy just smiled faintly back. 

“Yeah. Where I go, you go. Or where you go, I go. One or the other.” 

The smile on Goodnight’s face was enough to make Billy wish he’d been brave enough to tell the whole truth.

***

They both knew their work could get dangerous. They also both thought that Billy’s side of it was more dangerous. He was the one who did the shooting and the punching and getting in people’s faces, after all. If one of them ever got hurt badly, of course it was going to be Billy. And Billy didn’t worry about it too much – he was in the New-U system and would be until his debt was paid. If he got hurt badly enough to kill him, he’d just regenerate at the last station he’d passed and track Goody down and they’d get right back to business.

Every now and then, though, they’d find themselves in trouble together, regardless of how the plan was supposed to go. This time, for instance, they were just supposed to be making a delivery. Run some supplies out to Liar’s Berg, hand them off, get paid, nothing to it. Goodnight did the driving, Billy manned the turret gun in case of trouble. It should’ve been an easy in-and-out job. 

Instead, they’d run into a whole crew of raiders who’d set up camp on the icy pass they usually used as their path into town. 

“Swing left!” Billy shouted, and Goodnight jerked hard on the wheel and hit the brake to spin them in the right direction. He was a good driver, even on ice, and Billy was a good shot even with the less-than-precise aim of the minigun mounted on the roof of the light runner. The slide put Billy just where he needed to be, mowing down bandits and ducking their return fire until finally, after what felt like a hundred years or so, he managed to take out the last of them. For a moment, it was all eerily quiet, with no sound but the cold wind whistling past the mountains. 

Billy sighed, equal parts exhausted and relieved as he slumped down in the gunner’s seat. “Let’s get the hell out of here.” 

He expected to hear a laugh and feel the runner lurch forward, but neither happened. “Goody?” Billy frowned as he leaned over the turret, trying to get a look at his partner. “You all right?” 

But as soon as Billy saw him, he knew the answer to that question. Goodnight’s right side was a mess of blood, and he was barely breathing. With a panicked cry of his partner’s name, Billy flew out of the gunner’s seat to grab at Goodnight and try to figure out what his injuries were and if they had anything they could use for healing. 

“Billy?” Goodnight’s voice was raspy, like his lungs couldn’t give him enough air to speak at a normal volume. “Billy, I wanna tell you something.” 

“Tell me later!” Billy dug through his pack and Goody’s – nothing. They’d used the last syringe early in the fight, and it was stupid, so stupid. But Liar’s Berg wasn’t far now, it was just up the hill. They could make it, if Billy could just get into the driver’s seat. 

“Might not be a later,” Goodnight mumbled. Billy unbuckled the harness that held Goodnight to his seat and started dragging him out of the runner, refusing to accept the notion that there might not be a later. 

“Of course there will be, that’s how the passage of time works,” Billy snapped. He cringed at the pained sound Goodnight made as he pulled him from the driver’s seat and hauled him around to the gunner’s chair. 

“I mean there might not be a later for me,” Goodnight said, continuing despite the pain and his steadily weakening voice. “And I have to tell you, Billy—” 

“Shut up!” Billy strapped him in quickly and went leaping for the driver’s seat. Whatever Goodnight had to say, it could wait. He was saying it as Billy slammed the engine into gear and went tearing up the hill. He drove through the gate, blaring the horn so any pedestrians would get the hell out of the way, and came to a squealing stop right in front of the doctor’s office. 

“This man needs help!” Billy yelled, paying no mind to the stares or the angry shouting from people who didn’t think he ought to be driving at that speed through their town. He didn’t care about anything except getting Goodnight out of the gunner’s seat and getting him to the doctor. Billy gathered Goodnight in his arms to run for the doctor’s door – someone, bless them, opened it for him so he wouldn’t have to kick it down. Goodnight was weaker than he was even back on the ice. He was still trying to talk, but no sound came out, just a faint wheeze to accompany the slight movement of his lips. “Stay with me, Goody,” Billy desperately, quietly insisted. “Where I go, you go, remember?” And then, as soon as he spotted the woman in the lab coat, his voice was back to loud and demanding. “Help him!” 

She was there with a syringe in a heartbeat – and luckily, Goodnight still had enough of a heartbeat left for it to help. Doctors couldn’t fix death, not on the fly like this. They could fix pretty much anything else, though, including this kind of blood loss and organ damage. Instantly, Goodnight was breathing more easily, his heartbeat returning to something near normal. He still looked pained and exhausted, but he was alive, and Billy was so relieved he could have cried. 

“Thank you,” he whispered, and as she told him the price for the work Billy counted out the money without hesitation or complaint. He would’ve paid anything, would’ve paid _everything_ , to keep from losing Goodnight. 

Goodnight, who was blinking his eyes on the doctor’s table, slowly coming to. “Billy?” 

“Right here,” he said, and grabbed Goodnight’s hand. Maybe he shouldn’t have – but then Goodnight squeezed gently back, and Billy figured he’d done the right thing. “Come on, let’s get you somewhere you can rest.” 

“Need to drop the supplies,” Goodnight murmured, clearly still not all there, and Billy glared at him. 

“They can wait.” 

Liar’s Berg wasn’t a big town, but it was big enough to have a boarding house. Billy let Goodnight talk to the lady who ran the place, charming as always despite the state of his health, and soon they had a room for the next two nights. Two nights at Billy’s insistence – Goodnight was sure he’d be good to head back to Sanctuary by morning, but Billy was having none of it. 

“You are resting until you are back to full strength,” Billy informed him, and that was that. He stayed under Goodnight’s arm to support him on the way up the stairs, and carefully helped him to the bed in the corner. 

“Thank you,” Goodnight said. He looked about ready to pass out, but he wanted out of his boots and his blood-sticky clothes, so he started by dragging his jacket off his shoulders. Billy took it from him before Goodnight had a chance to worry about where to put it. 

“I’ll find someone who takes laundry,” Billy said. He was still watching Goodnight with worry, like he might still expire on him any second. Yes, he’d been to the doctor, and the worst of the damage was healed, but that didn’t mean Billy could just flip a switch and cancel the feeling that he’d nearly lost Goodnight. 

Goodnight saw the look, and he tried for a smile that might reassure Billy. “I’ll be fine, cher,” he said, though he still sounded weary. “Food and water and a bath and I’ll be right as rain. Nothing to worry about.” 

Like hell there was nothing to worry about, Billy thought, and they were never going on a job in a light runner ever again. He didn’t care that a technical was slower, it had walls and a windshield. They could take their damn time and make sure that Goody didn’t get shot up again. 

“I’ll get your boots,” Billy said, instead of any of the other things he was thinking. He didn’t want to argue right now. He just wanted to see Goody lie down and sleep and not hurt himself any further. 

Goodnight apparently didn’t feel like arguing either, because he let Billy unknot his laces and pull his boots off, setting them to the side with the jacket. Everything on Goodnight needed cleaning, so he might as well just pile it all up. In the meantime, he started working through the buttons of his vest, discovering the several bullet holes in it along the way. 

“Think this is gonna be trash,” he grumbled. “Probably the shirt, too.” 

“At least you’re alive to complain about it.” Billy took the vest and fished out the pocket watch before he tossed the ruined garment into the bin by the door. 

“There is that,” Goodnight dryly agreed. He unfastened the first few buttons and pulled his shirt over his head, promptly earning another concerned look from Billy. Billy could see the scars, the _several_ places where bullets tore through the skin, and was reminded anew of just how close Goodnight had come to death, and how easy it would be to come that close again. 

“Told you there would be a later,” Billy said, because he didn’t want to think about any of that anymore. He wanted to think about how Goody was here and alive and would be just fine as long as he didn’t do anything stupid. 

Goodnight looked up at him with a little smile. “Still glad I told you I love you before I bled out.” 

“What?” In a split second, Billy’s look went from concerned to incredulous. He hadn’t heard. He hadn’t even thought about what Goodnight had been trying to tell him. All he’d cared about in that moment was making sure Goodnight didn’t die. It had never occurred to him that it might be _that_. 

Goodnight frowned at the look on Billy’s face. “Didn’t I?” Goodnight was the one starting to look worried. He thought he’d told Billy, thought Billy was still here even so, but if he hadn’t gotten the words out, or Billy hadn’t heard them…

“I—I don’t know.” Billy still looked stunned, like he’d been hit with an unexpected jolt of electricity. “I…you love me?” 

“Yes, Billy, I do,” Goodnight softly admitted. “And I reckon I should’ve said it without having to get shot full of bullets first, but—” 

He didn’t get to finish, because Billy cut him off with the warmest, sweetest kiss of his life. This wasn’t at all how Billy had imagined things going, but it was perfect. He felt a rush of happiness overtake his disbelief at his good fortune, and he leaned in closer, letting the kiss deepen slow as a sunset. 

“I love you too,” he murmured, his lips barely leaving Goodnight’s. “I’ve loved you for so long, Goody.” 

Billy didn’t think he’d ever be able to say it, but here he was. Not only was he saying the words he’d been thinking for months, but hearing them as well. Goodnight might not be able to pull the trigger on his rifle without shaking anymore, but no one could ever tell Billy that Goodnight wasn’t brave. People put their lives in danger every day just by living on Pandora, but Goodnight had put his heart on the line. To Billy’s mind, that was harder – he hadn’t been able to do it, after all, no matter how many brushes with death he had.  
Goodnight initiated the kiss this time, and they went on like that for a while, until Goody finally admitted that he was getting lightheaded and ought to lie down. 

“Let’s get the rest of the bloody clothes off, first,” Billy said, which made Goodnight laugh softly. 

“This is really not how I ever planned on hearing you say that,” he complained as Billy helped him out of his belt and trousers. Those, at least, were salvageable. 

“I promise to be much sexier about it later,” Billy said as he scooped up the pile of clothes. He leaned down for another kiss before helping Goodnight to stretch out on the bed. “When it’s been more than half an hour since you nearly died.” 

“I’m holding you to that.” Goodnight’s eyes were already closed, despite his insistence on continuing to talk. Lord, did that man love to talk. Billy smiled fondly at the thought, and kissed Goody one last time before stepping out to take care of things. It was a little unusual for them, Goodnight getting shot and Billy being the one to go out and talk to people about replacing ruined clothes, but that was okay. They were still taking care of each other like always. Like they always would, Billy figured, because what did love mean if not that? 

People came to Pandora because they were desperate or crazy. Billy Rocks and Goodnight Robicheaux had been a little of both. But people _stayed_ on Pandora because they were optimists – because they’d found something they thought was worth saving and calling home. So Billy and Goodnight…they were staying.


End file.
